for president of the united states. democratic party. in charlotte, north carolina. can be described, perhaps, as a more subdued speech than the one that he gave at his initial convention four years ago. still touching on topics that are very popular. among his base. you had the tax issue, you had the issues of education. there were references to the automobile bailout. but still, john harwood who's with us, and larry kudlow still with us, and we have more guests coming in in a moment. there were parts that were surprising at times. opening up more land for natural gas drilling. we talk about tax reform. we talk about defense and strong on foreign policy. larry kudlow, did you feel this was a more centrist speech than you expected? >> no, not particularly. i mean, he said he was looking at the principles of bowles/simpson and simpson/bowles that those principles included pro growth tax reform across the board, getting rid of the deduction. he opposes that. he wants to raise taxes on the well to do. he demagogued on the